Facebook – Top 100 FAVORITE Video Games: 41

41: Portal (PC/360)
Developer: Valve
Year: 2007

Already 3 years old, Portal still amazes. For shits and giggles I loaded up the PC version a few months back, just to “speed run” it (so to speak) and found tons of fun was still packed behind every puzzle, witty one-liner, and moment of pure panic. With all that jazz about adding some extra bit of content to the end of the game at the end of the Spring, word came fast of a sequel to come, promising a ton of new content and hours upon hours of gameplay to experience. But, even when that game comes out, the original Portal will be the one that is remembered for not only jumpstarting the First Person Puzzle genre in the new age, but also for all the trends it set.

Based entirely in the Aperature Laboratories Enrichment Center, a place where smart men have created many great things for science (including a “neat gun”). The player takes on the role of Chell, a mute woman in the vein of Gordon Freeman, in that she is all actions and no words. Upon waking up to discover she exists in a world of insane puzzles that require her to stop thinking about time/space the same as before, Chell obtains a Portal gun and, under the advisement(?) of a super computer named GLaDOS, she sets out to conquer each room and free herself from the hell of blue and orange holes in the fabric of reality. Of course, by the end of the game you find out that everyone within the lab is dead and that the events outside the lab are in real-time with the events of Half-Life 2 (so to speak… it could take place just after the 7 Hour War or after the events of the games. We don’t really know) and that you may be all that’s left. This is engaging for a game based on platforming and item dropping, not because of the thickly-veiled narrative, but because of the insanely interesting characterization of GLaDOS, a character that has been spoken highly of so much these past three years, there is little point in extrapolating any further on the point.

The game looks and plays like Half-Life 2, which it should since its built on the exact same engine, with all the enhancements Episode 1 and 2 brought to the table. Smooth controls help make the game world flow and act with believable physics, and the smoothness of models is awesome, finally showcasing a time in which we can have honest to god rounded edges on things in a polygon game world. The environments, while very similar to each other, offer enough difference so that you know how distinct each test chamber is from the others. And, when you finally get past the last chamber…? Well, to avoid spoilers I won’t divulge too much information, here, but the game world takes on a whole new light, sometimes sinister, other times very sinister. Managing the Portal gun is a breeze, too, since its the only weapon you have. Primary and secondary fire modes provide the means for opening both orange and blue portals and creating the wacky, insane, and sometimes downright hilarious puzzles, and provides for their solutions.

But the two things everyone talks about in this game are as follows: its humor (which is seriously rich as fuck) and its fantastic puzzle design. For a first person game, the idea of crafty platforming is something only allowed to the excellent Metroid Prime series, but Portal adds that extra element of deep thinking and problem solving to move from level to level, map to map. Some puzzles will come easy, others will induce head-slapping moments of feeling like an idiot, but never do they become overly frustrating. As for the humor, well… as mentioned, GLaDOS is a riot to get to know, with all of her dialogue being sharp as fuck. A well-written character is essential if they’re the only one providing a speaking part, and the writing team behind Portal pulled a great trick out of their asses with this game, giving the gaming world its best super computer antagonist since SHODAN.

All in all, Portal is an immensely popular game for all the right reasons; its addictive, is a breeze to play, its got bragging rights-based challenge modes and trials to master, and its deeply funny and intelligent to boot. The amazing thing about this game, though, is that it wasn’t meant to be as huge as it was. Clocking in at probably a 4-hour average play time (for first time players, anyhow), Portal was just a tacked-on bonus for the Orange Box, a package that gave players HL2 and its expansions, as well as TF2. But Portal clearly won the show, being overly innovative and unique. Can’t wait for the sequel.

Classic Moment:
There are so many easy ones to comment on, but the one I’m going to stick with is in relation to Valve knowing that they may have created a fucking monster of a game; in some of the maps it is entirely possible to fuck it all up and get trapped outside of the puzzles. And with a game dedicated to providing multiple ways to accomplish things, having a few fuck-ups is to be expected. And expected that was, since GLaDOS provides built-in ways for you to get out of sticky situations, and not just simple “I’ll open a portal for you so you can free your dumb ass self” methods, but parts of the level open up or drop down to create a path back to the puzzle floor. This excellent design feature showcases how much talent really exists at Valve.

Why Portal > Link to the Past:
It may not be, in years to come. Hot off the heels of the Portal 2 announcement and the bonus three-seconds at the end of the game, Portal is a title that is very much in “the now” as far as gaming goes and – as such – is stuck where it is right now. But, having said that, while Link to the Past offers tons of fun, there is never a moment in Portal that isn’t of the highest quality. Few games can offer that kind of fantastic package, overall.

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Added March 15, 2017
The first Portal pales in comparison to Portal 2 and will never regain its top spot. There, I said it. Valve are masters are creating second games in a series as I feel HL2, P2, TF2, and L4D2 are all superior to their predecessors.
Having said all of that, the content they made for LEGO DIMENSIONS was a hoot and I laughed a lot while playing it.